On one hand, Americans want the government to spend more money to create jobs, while on the other hand they want to see the budget deficit cut, according to a Bloomberg poll.

And on both hands, they — two thirds of the poll’s respondents anyway — want the rich to pay for it through increased taxes.

The rich have turned into a source of resentment thanks to the bank bailouts and huge bonuses that bankers have awarded themselves this year, says J. Ann Selzer, president of Selzer & Co., a Des Moines, Iowa firm that conducted the survey for Bloomberg.

Almost 90 percent of respondents say the middle class will have to make financial sacrifices to trim the budget deficit, which totaled $1.4 trillion in the year ended Sept. 30.

But just over 25 percent support a tax increase for the middle class. And even less than that want to see cuts Social Security and Medicare or a new national consumption tax.

Worry about unemployment, now at about 10 percent, is stronger than concern about the budget deficit. Eight of 10 respondents see unemployment as a high risk to the economy, compared with 70 percent for the deficit.

The House recently acted on the public’s tax-the-rich sentiment. It approved a bill that would more than double a tax on income earned by executives of private equity and venture capital firms.

But the Senate is unlikely to follow suit.